KERC chief denies failure for low wind power output

 The Karnataka Electricity Regulatory Commission (KERC) rebutted that its tariffs payable to enterprises harnessing renewable energy (RE) to produce electricity are responsible for the low energy generation from RE sources in the State.

“We are not bottlenecks in generating power through RE, rather we are at the forefront of creating additional power.

This is evident from the slew of projects allotted to power  generators to the tune of 17,000 mw; if only 2,100 mw of wind power was actually commissioned, the blame is not necessarily on (low) tariff, but on environmental issues,” KERC Chairman M R Sreenivasa Murthy said at the two-day “CII Karnataka Conference on Power” here.

He was defending KERC as some speakers at the conference before him sought to blame the electricity regulator’s tariff payable to wind power generators fixed at Rs 3.70 per unit, which was considered “commercially unviable” by them and was cited as the reason for the lack of adequate to generate power through wind energy despite the enormous potential in Karnataka.